FCC Wireless Geographic License Areas

The FCC has a long history of using a variety of territory sizes ranging from the 734 Cellular Market Areas (“CMAs”) to a single national license. The chart below summarizes the relationships of the major FCC geographical license areas:

Site-based licenses. In the past, the FCC issued licenses for certain services such as AMTS based on a specific location of the transmitter. The licensee had exclusive use within a certain radius. Most spectrum with site-based licenses has since been auctioned on the basis of geographic areas, with carve-outs for the prior site-based licenses who were grandfathered.